


The Brighton Bluff

by Judybrandtner



Category: Outlander (TV), Outlander Series - Diana Gabaldon
Genre: Alternate Universe, F/M, the 40s
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2021-01-16
Updated: 2021-01-27
Packaged: 2021-03-13 22:16:03
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 1,612
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28785540
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Judybrandtner/pseuds/Judybrandtner
Summary: Claire Beauchamp Randall wants, needs, to get divorced from her estranged husband, but the laws only allow them in special scenarios. Her friend, Jenny, has an idea of how to go around the law, they just need a man and a hotel room, and Jenny has also an idea about who can be the man...
Relationships: Claire Beauchamp/Jamie Fraser
Comments: 32
Kudos: 120





	1. Chapter 1

London, Summer of 1946

Claire is taking her lunch, sat on a bench on the gardens around the hospital she was working as a nurse. It was cold, but she didn't mind, there was a lot of her mind and the cold helped to focus her mind. She had received that morning a letter from her husband's lawyer, her soon-to-be ex-husband, if she was lucky. The divorce laws, the bloody laws, she thought, only allowed divorce in three cases- Adultery, Abandonment and Domestic Violence-, and Claire and Frank didn't fit in any of them. It was a simple case of rush marriage, she was only 18 and, seemingly, head over heels with one of her uncle's co-workers at the British Museum. He was older, sophisticated and brilliant, and she was naive and blinded by him. As war appeared on the horizon, Frank had taken her one evening to the Registry for a quick ceremony, they weren't the only ones, as a string of men in uniform with blushed brides precede them. His uncle had been furious about the quick wedding, but Claire thought he was being irrational and assured him that Frank was the love of her life. After a short honeymoon in Scotland, it came time to part ways- Frank to Army duties, Claire to serve as a war nurse. They had seen each other just a handful of times during the long war, each time being cooler than the previous one. By the end of the war, they had tried to live together and rekindle they marriage without success, and so they had decided to separate, Claire going back to live with her uncle. Frank was now engaged with another girl, and wanted a divorce, preferably with him as the innocent part.

'Claire, there ye are.' One of her best friends, Jenny, a fellow nurse from Scotland, called her and soon was sat beside her on the bench. 'Is it everythin' OK?'

'Frank's lawyer sent me this.' Claire gave the letter to Jenny. 'He definitely wants a divorce, but we don't fit in any of the allowed cases. Also Frank is adamant of be the innocent part, and he's not having it in any other way.'

'And which are the cases?' Jenny asked.

'Adultery, but he doesn't want to get the girl he is now on this. Abandonment, but we decided to separate on our own accord. And Domestic Violence, but that one is definitely out of question.'

Later that week

Jenny run through the corridors of the hospital looking for Claire. 'Claire, I need to talk with ye.' She took Claire's arm and they walked towards the gardens.

'What are you about Jenny?' Claire asked as they took their places on their favourite bench.

'I think I found a solution for ye and Frank.'

'Did you?'

'I wrote to my Mam and Da and I included the story about ye and Frank.' Claire felt surprised Jenny decided to talk her parents about her, but Jenny carried on talking. 'Mary, ye ken, my brother Willie's wife told me that her sister was on the same situation with her ex-husband.'

'And what happened to her?'

'Her ex-husband asked a lass he worked with to go with him to a hotel on Skye and pose as his mistress. They had someone to make some photographs and present them as a proof of his adultery. It worked and they know live happily, Mary's sister is goin' to marry a lad from Broch Mhorda on the spring.'

'But Frank will never accept that.' Claire answered. 'He wants to be the innocent part.'

'No' Frank,' Jenny said. 'Ye would be the one doin' the play with a lad on a hotel.'

'No, no,no, I can't do that.' Claire said. 'And anyway, who in the World we could ask to do something like that with me? We can't ask in the hospital.'

'Actually, I was thinkin' in ask my brother.' Jenny said. 'He'd be a reliable partner.'

'Absolutely no, I'm not getting your brother in trouble with his wife.'

'No' Willie, my other brother, Jamie. Ye ken, the fireman.' Jenny showed her a photo of him she had on her purse, a tall, handsome man on a t-shirt and uniform trousers. 

Claire thought on it for few seconds. 'Do you really think he would do it? I mean, spend a night on a hotel with me, posing as my lover.'

'Aye, I think I can convince him to help.'


	2. Chapter 2

'So...' Jamie Fraser said over the chicken casserole Jenny had done for dinner. 'What exactly ye want me to do?' He looked at his sister, who was trying to feed 18-month-old Kitty. Ian, sat in the middle of the Fraser siblings, the stump of his missing leg on another chair, rolled his eyes before avoid his other two children-three-year-old Maggie and six-year old Jamie- from mess up on the table.

'Just goin' around the town with Claire looking, ye ken, a couple. Go to eat at some nice place, maybe a stroll on the pier, a dance...' Jenny finally explained. 'Her ex-husband will hire some photographers to follow ye up and get some pictures for the case.'

'And we are to share a room at the hotel?' Jamie asked again.

'Och, ye will posin' as lovers, Jamie, ye canna stay on places a mile apart.' Jenny answered.

'I ken ye want to help yer friend, but...'

'But what a brathair?'

'I'm no' what to say about share a room with a lass I barely ken.' That was the main issue he had with the whole plan. He took the photo of Claire Jenny had brought with her. She was a bonnie lass, one of the most beautiful he had ever seen, but Jamie had never been with a woman in any intimate way and he thought he might not know how to treat a woman like her as a lover would do.'

'Och, dinna fash for that, Jamie.' Jenny answered Jamie. 'T will be just be an innocent thin'. Anyway, ye'll be only sharin' the room for sleepin'.'

Jenny half-convinced him, and Jenny organised an encounter between Claire and Jamie at a cafe the next Sunday after church. Jamie gasped as he saw Claire at the table, wearing a pretty blue dress and a matching hat. Her legs, long and shapely; her breasts, the ideal size for his hands. She finally looked at him, bright red lips and golden eyes. She smiled at him and rose from her chair, waiting for him to reach the table.

'Please to meet you.' Claire offered a hand on a delicate glove to him and a whiff of a flowery perfume made every nerve on Jamie's body stand in attention. 'May I call you Jamie?'

'Aye, of course.' Jamie said. 'After, it we are going to do what we are going to do, 'tis better if we use our names. I dinna ken of a lot of lovers using Mister and Miss.' Claire laughed and Jamie felt like the Sun suddenly came out on a cloudy day. 'Shall we sit?'

'Oh yes!' Jamie gallantly moved Claire's chair to the table and sit in front of her, a waitress soon coming with a couple of cups of tea and some scones. 'I must confess, I am very nervous, you know. This is not something I ever thought I would be doing.' Claire took a sip of her tea.

'Aye, I ken. I wasna sure about it either when Jenny told me.' He took a bite of a scone. 'My mam's are better.' He whispered to Claire making her laugh.

'If they are something like Jenny's, I suppose they'll be really good.' 

'Och, they're better than Jenny's' Jamie made Claire laugh again.

'Well, I think we should know each other first, before we talk about any plans.' Claire said. 'I'm 25, 26 next November. I am a nurse, but you already know that one. I lived in Egypt for a while as a child, my uncle was directing an archaeological dig in the Valley of the Kings. I like to read, to take walks on the river bank and Edith Piaf's music.'

'I'm Jamie. I'm 24, just few weeks ago at the beginning of May. I am a fireman, as ye also ken. I moved to London durin' the war, to help Jenny and Ian with the bairns and Ian's recovery after he lost his leg in Africa. I like to ride, if I canna only do it in our farm in the Highlands. I love to read too and I can recognise a good whisky from a bad with just the smell of it.'

'That sounds interesting.' Claire laughed. 'You have to give me a class any of these days, whisky is my choice of drink too.'

'A lass who likes whisky,' Jamie laughed with her. 'I like that.'

'So...now we know the basics...' Claire decided to go to the difficult part. '...anything we should...negotiate? You know, about if we're doing it or not, and how.'

'Well, Jenny explained me the basics.' Jamie said. 'We'd be goin' to Brighton, get a fancy room and pass the weekend around town lookin' fancy while yer husband's men take photos of us to use for the divorce trial.'

'Yes, those are the basics. In public we should behave like, you know, we're together as a couple. Holding hands and maybe a rare kiss, once we're in the hotel. I want to know how comfortable you would be with that.'

'I suppose I can play the doting lover for a weekend.'

'Good, so...you are going to do it.'

'Aye, I'll help ye.'


End file.
